


No Quick and Easy Fix

by iloveyoudie



Series: Morseverse Prompt Fills [8]
Category: Lewis (TV)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Angst and Feels, M/M, Prompt Fic, Prompt Fill, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-05
Updated: 2019-01-05
Packaged: 2019-10-04 23:55:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17314193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iloveyoudie/pseuds/iloveyoudie
Summary: It was easier to accept an apology from James - quiet or cold or sad or screaming - than to try and give one himself.





	No Quick and Easy Fix

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lucyemers](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lucyemers/gifts).



> This was a prompt fill for tumblr.. 
> 
> The way you said I Love You - as an apology.
> 
> It got angsty I guess.

James had excused himself from the meeting as soon as possible, not even pausing to give Robbie a look when he stormed off. Everything from the hunched curl of his shoulders to the rigidity of his spine gave off a dangerous buzz of anger and watching him part the halls of the nick like Moses and the Red Sea, swirling his fitted coat around and on, would have been impressive if Robbie hadn't known with a sinking gut feeling that the mood was all his fault. 

It was wrong to say, but he preferred when James was the one who had buggered something up. He preferred stewing in his own quiet anger and roiling sadness when the lad lied or withheld from him, when he kept himself too privately or avoided Lewis until he couldn't anymore and awkwardly showed up on his doorstep with a bottle. Robbie shamefully preferred the days when he was still touchy about Val, when he'd shut down at errant probing questions and James's eyes would fall in disappointment because it had been reinforced that the pair of them hadn't yet gotten to that level of sharing. He even preferred James screaming at him with tears in his eyes in the middle of the street, bleeding raw heartache and making him feel it too. 

Yes it was typical and predictable of a person to not want to take blame, in their profession more glaringly than others, but it was still wrong. 

Robbie preferred not being the one at fault, in honest truth, because it was always easier to fix. The truth was that he couldn't stay upset at James for any significant amount of time and James so rarely screwed up anything. If James had buggered it up, or thought he did, Robbie could just put out his hand and bring him back in again. James was earnest and diligent and the gaps in communication were filled with unselfishness and loyalty. It was easier to accept an apology from James - quiet or cold or sad or screaming - than to try and give one himself. 

But Robbie had screwed the pooch this time, he'd been the one to crack the loyal and dedicated shell of James Hathaway, and for that there was no quick and easy fix. 

Robbie didn't hang about a second more than he had to. He lingered in the office only to decide a course of action, fingers drumming in agitation on the back of his chair because he couldn't even bring himself to sit. With a growl, he grabbed his own coat and adopted his best Angry Inspector look and thundered down the hallway and out of the building to find his wayward partner. 

The fact that James wasn't far, a few yards from the door in his usual lean, meant that he'd been waiting for Robbie to come and find him. If he didn't want to talk, he'd be long gone, but there he was with his coat pulled as taut across his shoulders as the stiff line of his jaw and his cigarette being pulled hungrily between his lips. Lewis waited and watched the man shift anxiously on his feet as if he were on the fence about doing a runner. As if sensing Robbie's eyes, James abruptly turned and stared at him. 

He was struck hot and cold at the same time. His skin chilled with shame and guilt and his insides flared hot with simultaneous anxiety and nerves. It was too late to change his mind so Robbie stuffed his hands deep into the pockets of his parka and approached. James turned his head away again, took another drag of his cigarette and flicked it with agitation into the gutter as if to do so were a dig at the older man. 

Knowing James, it was. 

"Let's go for a drink," Robbie hadn't actually thought of what to say, so he said that instead. 

"No," James didn't even blink. He straightened, sniffed a deep breath, and gave Robbie one of the hardest stares he'd ever given him, "Why did you tell Moody not to recommend me for the undercover posting?" 

"I didn't tell him not to recommend you," Robbie felt himself raising his defensive walls, pandering lightly to soothe James's simmering anger, "I told him that you'd do well _wherever_ you were assigned." 

James tilted his head and lowered his voice, "So where did the 'may not be a correct fit for the operation at this time' come in then, _Robert_?" 

That hit hard. He suddenly missed the days of the venomous 'sir'. When he heard his own name thrown at him like that, Lewis's throat dried up. 

James pulled out another cigarette and slouched into the wall again. The silence stretched. He lit it, he hit it, and then, with the fag between his fingers, he shook it accusingly, "You went off and retired. You told me to pursue my career in the police. I walked to _fucking-_ " 

James's lips pressed hard into a line as he cut himself off. His hands shook with a lack of articulation in his anger. 

"This was going to be a big step up for me. You, of all people, _you_ told them I wasn't right for it! You know if it was just Moody not wanting to lose his bloody arrest record, I would have at least understood. This was London, undercover, a big operation." 

"James, you and I know you haven't been right with what's going on with your dad and sister right now. And Moody _was_ dubious because of his bloody numbers. Superintendents are all the same," Robbie rubbed his forehead and got more to the real point, "And it's dangerous! Twelve month commitment, James. With bad people. Not Oxford dons or child prodigies. Dangerous people! A year is a long time for that sort of thing, not to mention living as another person." 

James let out another laugh this time, almost pained. His head tossed and he nearly grimaced through his anguished smile, "Did you think for even one second that I wanted it? That I genuinely wanted to go? That this wasn't just some check box on my resume?" 

Robbie didn't have an answer. He was guilty, perhaps, of thinking James did things out of necessity or because people pushed him to, because Robbie himself did the same thing. 

"No, you didn't," James took another drag of his cigarette and flicked the ashes effortlessly away from himself, "And I did want to go, by the way. Twelve months. Dangerous. As someone else," He let out a frustrated growl, "Being someone else for a year might've been a bloody relief!" 

"I'm sorry," Robbie sighed. He was, with every tangled convoluted strain of emotion and logic in his old and tired body, he was. He hadn't thought Moody asking his opinion would turn into this. He hadn't even thought James would find out. There would be other operations, other boxes filled on James's record, but now wasn't a good time. But he had meddled. Instead of talking about it with James, he'd meddled. Equally, James's desire for the undercover gig stung sharply, "Listen, I'll go talk to Moody-" 

"Don't bother. Posting's been filled," This cigarette was finished with near lightning speed and also flicked away. Not crushed and pocketed as he usually had. Flicked away. And Robbie became suddenly terrified that just like the used up butt, glowing and burning and surviving on only the sliver of tobacco left by the filter, that he was also just sputtering and holding on and waiting and James had finally caught on to his game. He'd be flicked away too and it would all be his own doing. 

"James," Robbie felt like he was choking on it, "I _am_ sorry." 

"Sorry is the Kool-Aid of human emotion," James just sounded disappointed and stopped himself a moment to snarl at nothing in particular. Robbie recognized a truncated quotation when he heard one. James exhaled his smoke sharply through his nostrils, "True sorrow is as rare as-" 

The blonde stopped again. He sagged a moment and the expression on his face could only be described as crestfallen. He'd gone from enraged to disappointed to unsure and defeated in such a short period time. A sudden realization he had felt like a soft blow to the gut. 

James peeled himself away from the wall and smoothed his collar up around his neck against the wind. He looked for all intents and purposes that he was done with the conversation. He was going to leave. 

"What's the end of that?" Robbie could hear his pulse in his ears now. His adrenaline spiked. Fear. He was deathly afraid. 

"What?" 

"The end of your quote. I know I'm no clever clogs but I know that's no Shakespeare, lad. True sorrow is as rare as-?" 

James again looked distressed and raked his hand hard through his hair, "It's from _Carrie_. Stephen King," He looked away, out into traffic, at nothing, "True love. True sorrow is as rare as true love. 

And that was the crux of it. He'd known from the first week of his retirement and then reinforced the first day back. Every half-passive criticism of something or other, every unintentional steering away of James from doing too much or going somewhere else. Even his own inability to simply settle down and leave well enough alone. It was all just an attempt to keep James close. Twelve months away, a full year in the seedy underbelly of London, a year that could be a shiny gold star on James's career was a year that Robbie wouldn't have him - wouldn't see him - couldn't talk to him. A year that could change them both beyond recovery. 

It was selfish. It was stupid. It wasn't even premeditated. It was just the subconscious cloying desperation of a lovesick fool. 

"Would you go for a drink with me if I said I was _truly_ sorry?" Robbie realized that in his coat pockets he was gripping the fabric desperately. His shoulders and back were burning with the tension as he waited. 

A shiver seemed to go through James as he cut a look to Robbie. His eyes were narrow and strange, suspicious and hurt and confused. There was a momentary crack, a tremor that started at his brows and rippled down his face in a hopeful sag of relief for one blissful moment before James's strict defenses shored themselves back up. 

Robbie needed that crack. He needed for James not to turn and walk away, not to go where he couldn't follow, "I'm sorry and I mean it. Because I love you. I know that's not an excuse for anything-" 

James took loud a deep inhale and spun away from him with his head cast back towards the sky. He stood like a statue for a moment and then with an obvious tremor his head dropped, he fished out his cigarette pack again and lit one. 

"James-" Robbie took a step forward and was embarrassed to find his voice come out like broken glass. 

"We should get that drink," James finally said, soft and cautious, and with an exhale of smoke. 

Lewis nodded, afraid to speak, and they began to walk down the street together. It was slow at first and then picked up the usual brisk and certain stride. In-step. They always walked in-step. 

And when they arrived at the door of the pub, James finished his cigarette. He paused as he did so, gave a thought, and stopped himself from flicking it to the pavement. In the usual practiced fashion he pressed it to the bottom of his shoe and disposed of it properly. 

It may have been nothing, abated anger or ingrained habit, but to Robbie Lewis it felt like everything. 

For better or worse. 


End file.
